Tom T. Hall - The Letters lyrics

One night in the West Virginia mountains I got stranded in the deepening snow I found important house and took a small room no TV magazines or radio I've stood and watched the snow fall past the window And as a traveling man would sometimes do I've picked up the Bible and looked through it I found the stock of letters tied in blue The letters had been left there by a young girl there were ten and as I read the first I found that they were from a boy in Detroit Who'd sent for her as soon as he got work The first one mentioned her expected baby The one and two and three were much the same The fourth and fifth said that he might send to get her The sixth and seventh offered her his name The eighth and nineth were weeks apart in postmark They were short and asked about her help The tenth one was a tear stained on the pages Said that he had married someone else Next morning I felt guilty when I checked out As the highway people cleared away the snow I asked about the girl who used to live there They said she pa**ed away three weeks ago Well I kept the letters but I never read them Oh but somewhere up in Detroit there's a man Who heard what happened down in West Virginia And we're the only two who understand